178
and that's why we're still waiting
the social network (mark/eduardo)
3,388 words. in which mark goes to see the movie *, mark and eduardo exchange text messages, and there is an inordinate amount of meta. a huge thank you to forochel for looking over this for me! you're the best, mishy. ♥
(translated into chinese by reiai here. ♥)
The weekend of the movie release, Mark sits surrounded by the entirety of his staff to watch a movie ostensibly about him. He’s bought out the theatre. The movie, it turns out, is not bad. Some of the details are wrong - Eduardo was never that stupid, just naïve, just friendly - but that’s to be expected. Eduardo may have given the author his testimony, but Mark certainly hadn’t. When it lacks, it lacks perspective.
“What’d you think?” Dustin asks, still holding a half-full tub of popcorn. He pops a handful in his mouth and raises his eyebrows. Mark shrugs.
“It’s a movie.” Mark glances over his shoulder at the several hundred employees all pulling out their mobiles. Some of them are probably updating their statuses, some of them might be tweeting. Some of them might be working from their Blackberrys. “It was fine.”
Dustin rolls his eyes. “That’s it?”
“That’s it.” Mark throws his plastic soda cup in the trash on the way out, and heads to his car.
Mark spends the evening watching interviews with the actors, the screenwriter, talking about their experience making the film. He wonders how hard that actor tried to meet him. He wonders if it would have made any difference. He doubts it.
He wonders if Eduardo felt about himself the way he was played - vulnerable, taken advantage of. Mark wonders if Eduardo left Palo Alto with the overwhelming taste of his own weakness, or just that of Mark’s betrayal.
Mark can safely say he’s never thought about Eduardo that way. And he’s thought about Eduardo a lot.
have you seen it yet? The text comes at 3:15 AM. Mark is still awake and sitting in front of his laptop. It’s not any more unusual than it ever was. He’s got his headphones on, and he’s playing old school Nine Inch Nails. The number isn’t one programmed into his phone, which means he’s either going to have to change his cell again, or it’s someone he knows who has changed his or hers. He doesn’t answer.
come on, mark, I know you’re awake. 3:37 AM. Mark stares at the unfamiliar numbers, and urges them to rearrange into something he recognizes. Code. Mark is good with numbers.
who is this? he types in reply, at 3:42 AM.
who do you think? 3:46 AM. Mark could find out, if he wanted to look away from this new program, which he doesn’t. He’s not that curious. He doesn’t like a lot of people, but he does know a lot of people.
At 3:48 AM, a picture message comes through. Mark doesn’t notice it until 3:56, when he reaches for another redbull, finding a lull in his rhythm.
At 3:57 AM, Mark clicks the tiny icon in the corner of his cell’s touch screen, and a picture of Eduardo’s face pops up. It’s too dark, and the only light is from the backlight of Eduardo’s phone and computer, completely washing him out. It’s still obviously Eduardo.
He’s smiling, just a little.
“Shit,” Mark says, out loud.
that’s a terrible picture of you, Mark sends at 4:00 AM, and then turns his phone off. Then, after a moment of complete stillness, he saves the program, and shuts down his computer.
When Mark finally turns his phone back on at 11:35 AM he has two missed calls and thirty-eight text messages. Half the texts are automated notices from employees, project updates, and both of the voice mails are from his assistant, Jeff, informing him of the status of the day’s meetings. He has to talk to Roberta in marketing first thing, which, for him, means just after lunch.
Two of the texts are from his mother, asking him how he is. She abbreviates just about every word, so it takes longer to decode than should be necessary. Three of the texts are from Eduardo.
you still haven’t answered my question. 4:10 AM.
you turned off your phone, didn’t you. dick. 4:25 AM.
you’re hotter than the guy they got to play you. 5:27 AM.
Mark isn’t sure what to do with any of these things, so he responds to none of them, waiting until he’s at least had some coffee and a cherry danish. He heads into the office in his apartment, and wonders if he should just write the day off and telecommute. He sips his coffee, some swanky South American roast that Jeff bought him for a company-sanctioned holiday, probably Christmas, but possibly Thanksgiving. Mark doesn’t really remember. It’s great coffee, delicious, but he spent several years subsisting on redbull and starch, so he’s not inclined to be picky. Not about food products, anyway.
The meeting with Roberta is unavoidable, however, so he types a note to himself for later - prgm xxi, write subscript for icon changes - and heads to the main office.
Before he goes, he reread the texts from Eduardo.
about the same level of oblivious, though, he sends back, and resists the temptation to turn his phone back off. He’ll need it to deal with traffic.
He doesn’t hear from Eduardo for the rest of the day, which he takes as a positive. Roberta only has good news, which is unusual but not unappreciated, and he walks quickly back to his corner office feeling slightly more on his game.
Dustin doesn’t often actually come into the office, but Chris still does, and he pokes his head around the doorframe at close to 3:00 PM. Mark’s programming, but he’s had the time to get used to multitasking. Chris doesn’t say anything, though, so eventually Mark sighs and spins his chair to face the doorway.
“What?” He still doesn’t have much in the way of vocal expression, but he manages to get the exasperation across.
“You’ve got balls, dude, you know that?” Chris asks.
“Sure,” Mark says, and shrugs. It’s not hard to have balls when you’ve only ever had one real friend, and now you don’t even have that. Probably the only thing the depositions taught Mark was how to really, honestly, not give a shit what other people thought of him. Well, that, and that he had no friends whatsoever.
“I think, if anything, buying out that theatre earned you major points with the staff, even if no one else cares.” Chris is smiling, lopsided, and Mark wishes he were still wearing a hoodie, so he could stuff his hands in his pockets.
“The staff already knows I’m an asshole.”
Chris laughs, and Mark smiles, just a little.
“Okay, true.” Chris waggles his eyebrows, and that’s when Mark gets a text from Eduardo.
no one liked you for your knowledge of social cues. There’s nothing to indicate if the tone is friendly or bitter, so Mark doesn’t draw any conclusions.
I’m pretty sure you’re the only one who liked me, he texts back, and resists the urge to add on an affectionate wardo.
“New chick?” Chris sounds like he’s hazarding a guess, which he is, because he and Dustin always make fun of Mark for not getting any.
“Nope.” Mark doesn’t explain. Chris just raises his eyebrows.
“Very mysterious,” he says. “Have fun with that.”
Mark gets home just before 9:30. He drops his keys on the table inside the entranceway, toeing off his shoes and wiggling his socked feet into the carpet. He goes into the kitchen, reheats the leftover Thai food he has from Monday evening, and opens his laptop in the living room, on the coffee table.
The whole apartment is sparse and minimalist in a way his mother had assured him was modern and classy. Mark hadn’t cared enough to protest. Some things more his pace have worked their way in - the overstuffed, threadbare chair he’d taken from the last house he and Sean had shared, the quilt he’d used on his bed in college, now draped over the back of the couch, the wardrobe in the bedroom that he’d bought at the salvation army - but mostly everything is impeccably kept just the way it was when he moved in. He finds a perverse pleasure in only using his fancy fridge for leftover takeout and sandwich related condiments.
Tonight, he pulls the quilt around his shoulders and goes trolling the internet for news about Eduardo. He doesn’t, actually, know the details of what Eduardo has done with himself, mostly because he can’t think about the situation for too long without feeling vaguely nauseous.
Eduardo, it turns out, has entirely ceased to exist on the internet. It’s like he’s teaching Mark a lesson.
why don’t you exist on the internet? he texts Eduardo. He hasn’t had anything to drink so there’s no excuse. He doesn’t think he really needs an excuse, though, since Eduardo broke the silence first. Mark was only keeping quiet out of deference, the sort of politeness he rarely bothers with. Eduardo’s kind of earned it.
mostly to avoid you. Eduardo replies almost immediately. Mark finds it hard not to draw logical conclusions from the speed of the response.
logical, he admits. He gets smiley face in return, a colon and then an uppercase d, but it’s unsatisfying.
Weekends, for Mark, are nominally the same as any other day. He sleeps in, makes coffee, checks his messages. Most of the time he goes into the office for at least a few hours, despite Jeff assuring him that he really doesn’t need to. He gets home, watches some TV, maybe heads to the pool in his building to swim laps, programs, goes to bed.
Eduardo shakes things up by texting him at 8:30 AM and waking him up.
have you learned to cook, yet? he asks. Like Mark will make time in his schedule to answer any of his questions. The truth being, of course, that Mark will.
nothing past pancakes from a mix, Mark says. eggs, pasta, the easy stuff.
pity you’ve never met my mom, Eduardo writes back. she makes the best breakfast in miami.
The friendliness throws Mark off, the casualness of it. He curls his toes into the top sheet, and stares at the text. He’s never met Eduardo’s parents, either of them. They were always too busy to visit Eduardo at school, and Mark knows that even though Eduardo has problems with his father, this bothered him.
Mark falls back asleep still clutching his phone. It’s not even 9. He’ll get back to it later.
are you sleeping? Mark texts Eduardo at 10:17 AM, and it should be safe, but Eduardo was known to sleep later than him, on occasion.
I was, yeah. By the time Eduardo responds, it’s 11:02 AM, and Mark is sitting at his desk in his pajamas. He’s answered about 79% of his email, and he’s got another hour or two of work before he can move on to the independent programs he’s building. Some of them he may, eventually, add onto Facebook, but a few of them are just to keep his fingers and his brain moving.
late sleeper, Mark says, in return, and he’s fishing for information, sure, but he recognizes that if Eduardo doesn’t want to give anything away, than he won’t give anything away. Eduardo is capable of subtlety in a way that Mark never will be.
it’s early here, Eduardo sends back. He doesn’t specify, but it’s the first indication that Mark has gotten that Eduardo is living very far away indeed. He wants to ask where, but he doesn’t. Half because he’s pretty sure Eduardo won’t tell him, and half because he’s afraid that Eduardo won’t tell him.
go back to bed, then, dumbass, he says, instead. He doesn’t hear from Eduardo again for another ten hours.
Things go on like this for longer than Mark thinks they will. Almost a month. Sometimes Eduardo starts conversations, not about anything in particular, but enough that Mark gathers he’s not living in the United States. His odd hours are enough to infer the time difference, at least.
Mark is the initiator almost as much, though this is mostly paranoia that if he doesn’t keep close contact, Eduardo will disappear back into the ether.
I made the whole company watch it, he says, sitting on the couch with the lights out and the television on. The channel is turned to MTV, but he’s not paying it much attention. Instead, he’s answering a month-old question. it was okay. it’s a movie. everything is more dramatic.
it seemed pretty dramatic at the time, Eduardo sends back. It’s 2:13 AM.
I was more of an asshole in real life, though. Mark doesn’t mind admitting it. They’d gotten the scene of Eduardo destroying his laptop correct in facts and timeline, but the actor had nothing on the actual betrayal on Eduardo’s face. His dark eyes, the slight trembling of his lower lip. Mark is never going to forget that.
very true, Eduardo says, at 2:40 AM. It’s a long stretch of time. Mark wonders if Eduardo wasn’t sure what to say. He lets it go.
Mark spends the next two weeks barely sleeping and subsisting on coffee and adrenaline. He only leaves the main office for two hours a time, and mostly, he sleeps on the couch in his office. It’s there, essentially, for just this purpose. The update is going to be a big one, and Mark doesn’t trust anyone else to oversee it. Being a control freak has gotten him this far.
He doesn’t talk to Eduardo about Facebook business, and Eduardo doesn’t ask. Not precisely, anyway.
you’re working on something big, aren’t you? The text comes in at 4:17 AM, when Mark is asleep on the couch. The vibration of his phone against the cushion underneath his head wakes him up. Mark grunts, and yawns, but answers anyway.
yeah, he says. how’d you know? He asks more because he’s too asleep to censor himself than because he thinks it’s a good idea. Eduardo obviously still knows him too well.
distracted, uncommunicative, out of touch for long periods of time? yeah, I remember this.
Mark grits his teeth and wonders if he’s ever going to escape the asshole he was when he was nineteen. Not that the movie is going to help with that, either.
sorry, he says. I’m barely sleeping.
Eduardo doesn’t text him back for another ten minutes. Mark almost gives up and goes back to sleep.
if it helps, I think that’s the first time you’ve ever apologized to me for it.
It shouldn’t help. Somehow, it does anyway.
He’s spacey and exhausted when he gets home, just after the maintenance has begun. This part is automated. They’ll call him with any problems.
He promptly takes a nap on his couch. He doesn’t even make it as far as his bedroom. Three hours later, the sun is going down, and he’s awake enough to remember to check his mail. He yawns, and scrubs a hand across his eyes, before shuffling to the pile he’d left next to his keys.
It’s mostly bills. The only interesting thing is a plain white envelope with no return address. His name and address are written in a neat, vaguely familiar script, but he can’t place it. Inside are two plane tickets to Singapore, dated for three weeks from now, and a short note.
mark,
is this enough of an answer for you? hope you take me up on it.
wardo
Mark stares at the tickets for almost seven minutes. Then he texts Jeff, and tells him to rearrange everything he has planned for that week.
The date closes in faster than Mark expects it to.
why singapore? he asks, about twelve days after it occurs to him to.
I went travelling. I ended up staying here, Eduardo says, three minutes later. It’s not a straight answer, but Mark isn’t sure he was really expecting one.
In fact, Mark is half positive that Eduardo isn’t living in Singapore at all, and is just being cruel. Mark probably would deserve it. It would be quite the long con, however, and Mark also can’t imagine Eduardo ever becoming that hard-hearted.
In the movie version of his life, Mark would probably be pacing, unable to concentrate. He’d probably sabotage himself before he even managed to set foot on the plane. The movie version hasn’t had years to mature. The movie version will never learn from his mistakes.
Mark likes to think he’s capable of it.
The plane leaves at 6:42 AM. It’s 10:42 PM in Singapore. The flight is 20 hours long. It’ll be tomorrow afternoon by the time he arrives.
Mark orders a glass of orange juice, and tucks his supplied blanket around his legs. Eduardo had arranged for business class tickets, and Mark takes advantage of this, stretching out and tilting his seat back. He curls up on his side, taking off his seatbelt and facing the window. The flight attendant asks him if he’s comfortable, and he pretends to sleep. When they dim the lights, he finally does.
Mark never checks baggage. He doesn’t like waiting at baggage claim, and he doesn’t like being away from home long enough that he’d need to.
This will be the longest break he’s had in at least five years, and he’s only going to be gone for eight days.
He thinks about this while the plane is landing, but he can’t think of any way he’d rather live his life. He spends most of his time in front of a computer. He has the means to try any sort of program he wants to. He has more freedom than 97% of the population.
Still, he thinks, wheeling his suitcase behind him as he disembarks. It’s not like he has everything he wants. He doesn’t think that’s possible.
He can feel the humidity as he steps off the plane, settling against his skin like a wet cloth. It’s a momentary discomfort, just the air seeping through the imperfect seal between the plane and the gate, before he moves forward into the air-conditioning. It’s a taste of what this week will be like, maybe.
He lets the soles of his shoes scuff against the ground as he walks, and he’s dawdling a little and he knows it. The test is this - will Eduardo actually be waiting for him? Will he have sent someone to drive Mark? Does he even live here?
He reaches the edge of the terminal, and stares across and out to the waiting area.
He doesn’t know why he’s surprised to see Eduardo - wearing a t-shirt, even, and sandals peeking out from underneath the too-long hem of his baggy pants - but he still is. He can feel it catch in his throat, like a cough. He stands motionless, and Eduardo still sees him.
Eduardo raises his hand in what is probably some kind of casual greeting, but just looks like a half-aborted wave. He’s not smiling, explicitly, but there’s the tell-tale upturn in the corners of his mouth. Mark hasn’t seen him in person since just after the depositions ended, but he still knows the signs. He wheels his suitcase forward, and walks with it.
“Hello,” he says. He doesn’t offer his hand, because he doesn’t know if there is some kind of no-touch policy, or if Eduardo would hug him, or shake his hand, or punch him, maybe.
“Stop thinking so hard,” Eduardo says, smiling a little more.
“I’m still working through the fact that you’re actually here to meet me,” Mark says. He’s honest more out of surprise than any desire to share, but it still has a positive effect on Eduardo. He laughs.
“No trick,” he says, and then he pulls Mark into a hug. It’s a quick thing, just Eduardo’s hands flat against his back, and Eduardo’s chin on his shoulder, but it’s enough to make Mark’s pulse thunder in his veins.
“You look different. Better.” He’s not lying. Eduardo is tanner than ever, and broader, and more muscular. He’s not a brawny guy, it would be impossible for him, but he looks healthy, and active. A little bit older.
“You look about the same,” Eduardo says, and manages to make it not sound like a bad thing. Mark still thinks that it kind of is.
“I’m not, though,” he says. “I promise.”
“I know,” Eduardo replies, and grabs his bag. “That’s why you’re here.”
*to clarify, in case it needs clarifying - this isn't rps. it's the fictional characters mark and eduardo going to see a fictionalized movie of the events that take place during the movie the social network. SO THERE YOU HAVE IT. as if that wasn't complicated enough.
the social network (mark/eduardo)
3,388 words. in which mark goes to see the movie *, mark and eduardo exchange text messages, and there is an inordinate amount of meta. a huge thank you to forochel for looking over this for me! you're the best, mishy. ♥
(translated into chinese by reiai here. ♥)
The weekend of the movie release, Mark sits surrounded by the entirety of his staff to watch a movie ostensibly about him. He’s bought out the theatre. The movie, it turns out, is not bad. Some of the details are wrong - Eduardo was never that stupid, just naïve, just friendly - but that’s to be expected. Eduardo may have given the author his testimony, but Mark certainly hadn’t. When it lacks, it lacks perspective.
“What’d you think?” Dustin asks, still holding a half-full tub of popcorn. He pops a handful in his mouth and raises his eyebrows. Mark shrugs.
“It’s a movie.” Mark glances over his shoulder at the several hundred employees all pulling out their mobiles. Some of them are probably updating their statuses, some of them might be tweeting. Some of them might be working from their Blackberrys. “It was fine.”
Dustin rolls his eyes. “That’s it?”
“That’s it.” Mark throws his plastic soda cup in the trash on the way out, and heads to his car.
Mark spends the evening watching interviews with the actors, the screenwriter, talking about their experience making the film. He wonders how hard that actor tried to meet him. He wonders if it would have made any difference. He doubts it.
He wonders if Eduardo felt about himself the way he was played - vulnerable, taken advantage of. Mark wonders if Eduardo left Palo Alto with the overwhelming taste of his own weakness, or just that of Mark’s betrayal.
Mark can safely say he’s never thought about Eduardo that way. And he’s thought about Eduardo a lot.
have you seen it yet? The text comes at 3:15 AM. Mark is still awake and sitting in front of his laptop. It’s not any more unusual than it ever was. He’s got his headphones on, and he’s playing old school Nine Inch Nails. The number isn’t one programmed into his phone, which means he’s either going to have to change his cell again, or it’s someone he knows who has changed his or hers. He doesn’t answer.
come on, mark, I know you’re awake. 3:37 AM. Mark stares at the unfamiliar numbers, and urges them to rearrange into something he recognizes. Code. Mark is good with numbers.
who is this? he types in reply, at 3:42 AM.
who do you think? 3:46 AM. Mark could find out, if he wanted to look away from this new program, which he doesn’t. He’s not that curious. He doesn’t like a lot of people, but he does know a lot of people.
At 3:48 AM, a picture message comes through. Mark doesn’t notice it until 3:56, when he reaches for another redbull, finding a lull in his rhythm.
At 3:57 AM, Mark clicks the tiny icon in the corner of his cell’s touch screen, and a picture of Eduardo’s face pops up. It’s too dark, and the only light is from the backlight of Eduardo’s phone and computer, completely washing him out. It’s still obviously Eduardo.
He’s smiling, just a little.
“Shit,” Mark says, out loud.
that’s a terrible picture of you, Mark sends at 4:00 AM, and then turns his phone off. Then, after a moment of complete stillness, he saves the program, and shuts down his computer.
When Mark finally turns his phone back on at 11:35 AM he has two missed calls and thirty-eight text messages. Half the texts are automated notices from employees, project updates, and both of the voice mails are from his assistant, Jeff, informing him of the status of the day’s meetings. He has to talk to Roberta in marketing first thing, which, for him, means just after lunch.
Two of the texts are from his mother, asking him how he is. She abbreviates just about every word, so it takes longer to decode than should be necessary. Three of the texts are from Eduardo.
you still haven’t answered my question. 4:10 AM.
you turned off your phone, didn’t you. dick. 4:25 AM.
you’re hotter than the guy they got to play you. 5:27 AM.
Mark isn’t sure what to do with any of these things, so he responds to none of them, waiting until he’s at least had some coffee and a cherry danish. He heads into the office in his apartment, and wonders if he should just write the day off and telecommute. He sips his coffee, some swanky South American roast that Jeff bought him for a company-sanctioned holiday, probably Christmas, but possibly Thanksgiving. Mark doesn’t really remember. It’s great coffee, delicious, but he spent several years subsisting on redbull and starch, so he’s not inclined to be picky. Not about food products, anyway.
The meeting with Roberta is unavoidable, however, so he types a note to himself for later - prgm xxi, write subscript for icon changes - and heads to the main office.
Before he goes, he reread the texts from Eduardo.
about the same level of oblivious, though, he sends back, and resists the temptation to turn his phone back off. He’ll need it to deal with traffic.
He doesn’t hear from Eduardo for the rest of the day, which he takes as a positive. Roberta only has good news, which is unusual but not unappreciated, and he walks quickly back to his corner office feeling slightly more on his game.
Dustin doesn’t often actually come into the office, but Chris still does, and he pokes his head around the doorframe at close to 3:00 PM. Mark’s programming, but he’s had the time to get used to multitasking. Chris doesn’t say anything, though, so eventually Mark sighs and spins his chair to face the doorway.
“What?” He still doesn’t have much in the way of vocal expression, but he manages to get the exasperation across.
“You’ve got balls, dude, you know that?” Chris asks.
“Sure,” Mark says, and shrugs. It’s not hard to have balls when you’ve only ever had one real friend, and now you don’t even have that. Probably the only thing the depositions taught Mark was how to really, honestly, not give a shit what other people thought of him. Well, that, and that he had no friends whatsoever.
“I think, if anything, buying out that theatre earned you major points with the staff, even if no one else cares.” Chris is smiling, lopsided, and Mark wishes he were still wearing a hoodie, so he could stuff his hands in his pockets.
“The staff already knows I’m an asshole.”
Chris laughs, and Mark smiles, just a little.
“Okay, true.” Chris waggles his eyebrows, and that’s when Mark gets a text from Eduardo.
no one liked you for your knowledge of social cues. There’s nothing to indicate if the tone is friendly or bitter, so Mark doesn’t draw any conclusions.
I’m pretty sure you’re the only one who liked me, he texts back, and resists the urge to add on an affectionate wardo.
“New chick?” Chris sounds like he’s hazarding a guess, which he is, because he and Dustin always make fun of Mark for not getting any.
“Nope.” Mark doesn’t explain. Chris just raises his eyebrows.
“Very mysterious,” he says. “Have fun with that.”
Mark gets home just before 9:30. He drops his keys on the table inside the entranceway, toeing off his shoes and wiggling his socked feet into the carpet. He goes into the kitchen, reheats the leftover Thai food he has from Monday evening, and opens his laptop in the living room, on the coffee table.
The whole apartment is sparse and minimalist in a way his mother had assured him was modern and classy. Mark hadn’t cared enough to protest. Some things more his pace have worked their way in - the overstuffed, threadbare chair he’d taken from the last house he and Sean had shared, the quilt he’d used on his bed in college, now draped over the back of the couch, the wardrobe in the bedroom that he’d bought at the salvation army - but mostly everything is impeccably kept just the way it was when he moved in. He finds a perverse pleasure in only using his fancy fridge for leftover takeout and sandwich related condiments.
Tonight, he pulls the quilt around his shoulders and goes trolling the internet for news about Eduardo. He doesn’t, actually, know the details of what Eduardo has done with himself, mostly because he can’t think about the situation for too long without feeling vaguely nauseous.
Eduardo, it turns out, has entirely ceased to exist on the internet. It’s like he’s teaching Mark a lesson.
why don’t you exist on the internet? he texts Eduardo. He hasn’t had anything to drink so there’s no excuse. He doesn’t think he really needs an excuse, though, since Eduardo broke the silence first. Mark was only keeping quiet out of deference, the sort of politeness he rarely bothers with. Eduardo’s kind of earned it.
mostly to avoid you. Eduardo replies almost immediately. Mark finds it hard not to draw logical conclusions from the speed of the response.
logical, he admits. He gets smiley face in return, a colon and then an uppercase d, but it’s unsatisfying.
Weekends, for Mark, are nominally the same as any other day. He sleeps in, makes coffee, checks his messages. Most of the time he goes into the office for at least a few hours, despite Jeff assuring him that he really doesn’t need to. He gets home, watches some TV, maybe heads to the pool in his building to swim laps, programs, goes to bed.
Eduardo shakes things up by texting him at 8:30 AM and waking him up.
have you learned to cook, yet? he asks. Like Mark will make time in his schedule to answer any of his questions. The truth being, of course, that Mark will.
nothing past pancakes from a mix, Mark says. eggs, pasta, the easy stuff.
pity you’ve never met my mom, Eduardo writes back. she makes the best breakfast in miami.
The friendliness throws Mark off, the casualness of it. He curls his toes into the top sheet, and stares at the text. He’s never met Eduardo’s parents, either of them. They were always too busy to visit Eduardo at school, and Mark knows that even though Eduardo has problems with his father, this bothered him.
Mark falls back asleep still clutching his phone. It’s not even 9. He’ll get back to it later.
are you sleeping? Mark texts Eduardo at 10:17 AM, and it should be safe, but Eduardo was known to sleep later than him, on occasion.
I was, yeah. By the time Eduardo responds, it’s 11:02 AM, and Mark is sitting at his desk in his pajamas. He’s answered about 79% of his email, and he’s got another hour or two of work before he can move on to the independent programs he’s building. Some of them he may, eventually, add onto Facebook, but a few of them are just to keep his fingers and his brain moving.
late sleeper, Mark says, in return, and he’s fishing for information, sure, but he recognizes that if Eduardo doesn’t want to give anything away, than he won’t give anything away. Eduardo is capable of subtlety in a way that Mark never will be.
it’s early here, Eduardo sends back. He doesn’t specify, but it’s the first indication that Mark has gotten that Eduardo is living very far away indeed. He wants to ask where, but he doesn’t. Half because he’s pretty sure Eduardo won’t tell him, and half because he’s afraid that Eduardo won’t tell him.
go back to bed, then, dumbass, he says, instead. He doesn’t hear from Eduardo again for another ten hours.
Things go on like this for longer than Mark thinks they will. Almost a month. Sometimes Eduardo starts conversations, not about anything in particular, but enough that Mark gathers he’s not living in the United States. His odd hours are enough to infer the time difference, at least.
Mark is the initiator almost as much, though this is mostly paranoia that if he doesn’t keep close contact, Eduardo will disappear back into the ether.
I made the whole company watch it, he says, sitting on the couch with the lights out and the television on. The channel is turned to MTV, but he’s not paying it much attention. Instead, he’s answering a month-old question. it was okay. it’s a movie. everything is more dramatic.
it seemed pretty dramatic at the time, Eduardo sends back. It’s 2:13 AM.
I was more of an asshole in real life, though. Mark doesn’t mind admitting it. They’d gotten the scene of Eduardo destroying his laptop correct in facts and timeline, but the actor had nothing on the actual betrayal on Eduardo’s face. His dark eyes, the slight trembling of his lower lip. Mark is never going to forget that.
very true, Eduardo says, at 2:40 AM. It’s a long stretch of time. Mark wonders if Eduardo wasn’t sure what to say. He lets it go.
Mark spends the next two weeks barely sleeping and subsisting on coffee and adrenaline. He only leaves the main office for two hours a time, and mostly, he sleeps on the couch in his office. It’s there, essentially, for just this purpose. The update is going to be a big one, and Mark doesn’t trust anyone else to oversee it. Being a control freak has gotten him this far.
He doesn’t talk to Eduardo about Facebook business, and Eduardo doesn’t ask. Not precisely, anyway.
you’re working on something big, aren’t you? The text comes in at 4:17 AM, when Mark is asleep on the couch. The vibration of his phone against the cushion underneath his head wakes him up. Mark grunts, and yawns, but answers anyway.
yeah, he says. how’d you know? He asks more because he’s too asleep to censor himself than because he thinks it’s a good idea. Eduardo obviously still knows him too well.
distracted, uncommunicative, out of touch for long periods of time? yeah, I remember this.
Mark grits his teeth and wonders if he’s ever going to escape the asshole he was when he was nineteen. Not that the movie is going to help with that, either.
sorry, he says. I’m barely sleeping.
Eduardo doesn’t text him back for another ten minutes. Mark almost gives up and goes back to sleep.
if it helps, I think that’s the first time you’ve ever apologized to me for it.
It shouldn’t help. Somehow, it does anyway.
He’s spacey and exhausted when he gets home, just after the maintenance has begun. This part is automated. They’ll call him with any problems.
He promptly takes a nap on his couch. He doesn’t even make it as far as his bedroom. Three hours later, the sun is going down, and he’s awake enough to remember to check his mail. He yawns, and scrubs a hand across his eyes, before shuffling to the pile he’d left next to his keys.
It’s mostly bills. The only interesting thing is a plain white envelope with no return address. His name and address are written in a neat, vaguely familiar script, but he can’t place it. Inside are two plane tickets to Singapore, dated for three weeks from now, and a short note.
mark,
is this enough of an answer for you? hope you take me up on it.
wardo
Mark stares at the tickets for almost seven minutes. Then he texts Jeff, and tells him to rearrange everything he has planned for that week.
The date closes in faster than Mark expects it to.
why singapore? he asks, about twelve days after it occurs to him to.
I went travelling. I ended up staying here, Eduardo says, three minutes later. It’s not a straight answer, but Mark isn’t sure he was really expecting one.
In fact, Mark is half positive that Eduardo isn’t living in Singapore at all, and is just being cruel. Mark probably would deserve it. It would be quite the long con, however, and Mark also can’t imagine Eduardo ever becoming that hard-hearted.
In the movie version of his life, Mark would probably be pacing, unable to concentrate. He’d probably sabotage himself before he even managed to set foot on the plane. The movie version hasn’t had years to mature. The movie version will never learn from his mistakes.
Mark likes to think he’s capable of it.
The plane leaves at 6:42 AM. It’s 10:42 PM in Singapore. The flight is 20 hours long. It’ll be tomorrow afternoon by the time he arrives.
Mark orders a glass of orange juice, and tucks his supplied blanket around his legs. Eduardo had arranged for business class tickets, and Mark takes advantage of this, stretching out and tilting his seat back. He curls up on his side, taking off his seatbelt and facing the window. The flight attendant asks him if he’s comfortable, and he pretends to sleep. When they dim the lights, he finally does.
Mark never checks baggage. He doesn’t like waiting at baggage claim, and he doesn’t like being away from home long enough that he’d need to.
This will be the longest break he’s had in at least five years, and he’s only going to be gone for eight days.
He thinks about this while the plane is landing, but he can’t think of any way he’d rather live his life. He spends most of his time in front of a computer. He has the means to try any sort of program he wants to. He has more freedom than 97% of the population.
Still, he thinks, wheeling his suitcase behind him as he disembarks. It’s not like he has everything he wants. He doesn’t think that’s possible.
He can feel the humidity as he steps off the plane, settling against his skin like a wet cloth. It’s a momentary discomfort, just the air seeping through the imperfect seal between the plane and the gate, before he moves forward into the air-conditioning. It’s a taste of what this week will be like, maybe.
He lets the soles of his shoes scuff against the ground as he walks, and he’s dawdling a little and he knows it. The test is this - will Eduardo actually be waiting for him? Will he have sent someone to drive Mark? Does he even live here?
He reaches the edge of the terminal, and stares across and out to the waiting area.
He doesn’t know why he’s surprised to see Eduardo - wearing a t-shirt, even, and sandals peeking out from underneath the too-long hem of his baggy pants - but he still is. He can feel it catch in his throat, like a cough. He stands motionless, and Eduardo still sees him.
Eduardo raises his hand in what is probably some kind of casual greeting, but just looks like a half-aborted wave. He’s not smiling, explicitly, but there’s the tell-tale upturn in the corners of his mouth. Mark hasn’t seen him in person since just after the depositions ended, but he still knows the signs. He wheels his suitcase forward, and walks with it.
“Hello,” he says. He doesn’t offer his hand, because he doesn’t know if there is some kind of no-touch policy, or if Eduardo would hug him, or shake his hand, or punch him, maybe.
“Stop thinking so hard,” Eduardo says, smiling a little more.
“I’m still working through the fact that you’re actually here to meet me,” Mark says. He’s honest more out of surprise than any desire to share, but it still has a positive effect on Eduardo. He laughs.
“No trick,” he says, and then he pulls Mark into a hug. It’s a quick thing, just Eduardo’s hands flat against his back, and Eduardo’s chin on his shoulder, but it’s enough to make Mark’s pulse thunder in his veins.
“You look different. Better.” He’s not lying. Eduardo is tanner than ever, and broader, and more muscular. He’s not a brawny guy, it would be impossible for him, but he looks healthy, and active. A little bit older.
“You look about the same,” Eduardo says, and manages to make it not sound like a bad thing. Mark still thinks that it kind of is.
“I’m not, though,” he says. “I promise.”
“I know,” Eduardo replies, and grabs his bag. “That’s why you’re here.”
*to clarify, in case it needs clarifying - this isn't rps. it's the fictional characters mark and eduardo going to see a fictionalized movie of the events that take place during the movie the social network. SO THERE YOU HAVE IT. as if that wasn't complicated enough.